Com­pen­sate for non-pro­cess­ing of cheque: Tele­com firm told

Hold­ing that writ­ing of a date in na­tional cal­en­dar for­mat in any in­stru­ment is valid, the Thane District Con­sumer Re­dres­sal Fo­rum has asked Voda­fone to com­pen­sate a cus­tomer for not pro­cess­ing his bill pay­ment.

The cal­en­dar for­mat, some­times re­ferred to us ‘shaka cal­en­dar’, was adopted in 1957.

In their or­der on Wed­nes­day, fo­rum pres­i­dent Sneha S Mha­tre and mem­bers Madhuri S Vish­warupe and ND Kadam or­dered Voda­fone to pay a com­pen­sa­tion of Rs7,000 to the cus­tomer, Shri­pad Bamb­horikar, to­ward men­tal ha­rass­ment and le­gal charges. Bamb­horikar had de­posited a cheque writ­ten in the na­tional cal­en­dar for­mat against the bill, which did not get pro­cessed by the com­pany.

Bamb­horikar had al­leged Voda­fone had not sent the cheque for clear­ance, stat­ing the rea­son that the date for­mat was not valid. He in­formed the ser­vice provider about a cir­cu­lar is­sued by RBI on July 1,2009 , di­rect­ing banks to ac­cept the cheques writ­ten in Na­tional date for­mat.

The fo­rum con­cluded that the ser­vice provider was at fault and there was de­fi­ciency in its ser­vices in not send­ing the cheque with date in Na­tional Cal­en­der for­mat on it for clear­ance.

A Voda­fone In­dia spokesper­son said it did present the cheque with its bank, which in turn re­turned it on tech­ni­cal grounds.

“An ear­lier plea made to the court by Voda­fone to make the bank party to the case was not ac­cepted. We will ap­peal against the or­der along with an ap­pli­ca­tion for the con­cerned bank to be made a party to the case,” he said in a state­ment.

The fo­rum has also asked Voda­fone t o re­store Bamb­horikar’s con­nec­tion by March, or else pay a com­pen­sa­tion of Rs 1,000 per month.

The TRAI had on March 30,2014, di­rected the ser­vice provider to ac­cept the cheque af­ter which the ser­vice provider sent the cheque for clear­ance and it was cleared on April 7,2014.

The next pay­ment which was made vide cheque with the date in the na­tional cal­en­der for­mat was re­turned cit­ing in­valid date and the ser­vice provider dis­con­nected the mo­bile ser­vices.